Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;566878As a consumer, are you driven to purchase systems that freely offer their rules online?

Yes, but only if it's good.
Yes, i bought both Eclipse Phase and Stars Without Number, but i also bought the Swords&Wizardry Complete Rulebook by Frog God Games as well.

Actually I do have great libraries where I live, they're often ranked in the top 5, if not #1 in the country. Of the 3 that I use (who also have borrowing rights networked throughout the entire state) the biggest one had a circulation close to 17.5 million a few years ago. Their most recent financial statement (Dec '11) showed over 700,000 registered library patrons.

Quote from: ptingler;567340Actually I do have great libraries where I live, they're often ranked in the top 5, if not #1 in the country. Of the 3 that I use (who also have borrowing rights networked throughout the entire state) the biggest one had a circulation close to 17.5 million a few years ago. Their most recent financial statement (Dec '11) showed over 700,000 registered library patrons.

Unless its a magic library, it doesn't do anything like what I described. I look forward to reading your creative work in six months, it shall be shared with gusto. Try and keep it sub $10k because, yanno.

Quote from: The Traveller;567304You should show your appreciation by working your ass off for six months of your life and spending thousands of dollars you don't really have to spare in creating something, then giving it to that library so anyone who wants to can enjoy your efforts in a similar fashion.

It useful to look at first principles in debates like this.

In the United States copyright exists to promote progress of the arts and sciences.

QuoteTo promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

The founding fathers were leery of copyright and patents as they were abused by the British King and the other crowned heads of Europe to reward favorites, censor works, or suppress inventions.

Without this provision the tendency be would for authors and inventors would be hide their work or work only for commissions by wealthy patrons.

However it not an absolute right. While every creative work is original every creative work is at the same time based on something that came before. Authors build on those that came before and others will build on them.

It is not fair that author can't profit from their work but it also not fair that other can't use their work freely as part of the common heritage of all people. Somewhere there is a balance, a balance I think the founding fathers of the United States did a good job of setting.

I think today the situation is out of hand. Patents are interpreted too broadly, obvious, or poorly written. The duration of copyright are way too long and the added duration creates a lottery atmosphere of striking it rich rather than promoting advancement in the arts.

Even worse the long duration of copyright threatens the preservation of many important works because the legal owners can not be found or are indifferent to their fate. Works that originated in the 1920s and 30 with their original creators long dead.

Fortunately people are figuring out how to route around the damage by creating a variety of open licenses and using them for their creative works. That the stronger and longer they try make copyrights the more useful these licenses become. And if should the opposite occur then they will revert to the public domain. In either case the work is free for everybody to use.

So after this long polemic, yes I am likewise glad libraries exist and would fight for their continued existence in making our common heritage freely available to all.

Quote from: The Traveller;567342Unless its a magic library, it doesn't do anything like what I described. I look forward to reading your creative work in six months, it shall be shared with gusto. Try and keep it sub $10k because, yanno.

I feel sad for people like you who think books only exist to be possessed or profited from. Some people actually read to gain knowledge or for research, but those words are probably an anathema to you. And to meet your idiotic need to make a library let you possess the item, the smallest of the three actually does that with MP3s. When you "request" a song you get a download link to a DRM free MP3 copy of the song which you then legally own. They are at the forefront of library usage.

Quote from: estar;567343The founding fathers were leery of copyright and patents as they were abused by the British King and the other crowned heads of Europe to reward favorites, censor works, or suppress inventions.

Indeed, this makes the irony of China ignoring copyrights and patents in the same way the US did at the start of the 20th century all the more interesting. Even funnier is how Hollywood exists for the same reason, patent evasion, given their ongoing pogroms. Actually now that you mention it, the modern day abuse of patents and copyrights is eerily similar to what happened regarding the aristocracy, the biggest campaign donations get the goose.

Quote from: estar;567343I think today the situation is out of hand. Patents are interpreted too broadly, obvious, or poorly written. The duration of copyright are way too long and the added duration creates a lottery atmosphere of striking it rich rather than promoting advancement in the arts.

Even worse the long duration of copyright threatens the preservation of many important works because the legal owners can not be found or are indifferent to their fate. Works that originated in the 1920s and 30 with their original creators long dead.

Yes, this is why I suggested reducing the length of copyrights drastically.

Quote from: estar;567343So after this long polemic, yes I am likewise glad libraries exist and would fight for their continued existence in making our common heritage freely available to all.

I have no difficulty with libraries. I do have difficulty with someone using the concept to excuse piracy.

Quote from: ptingler;567347I feel sad for people like you who think books only exist to be possessed or profited from. Some people actually read to gain knowledge or for research, but those words are probably an anathema to you. And to meet your idiotic need to make a library let you possess the item, the smallest of the three actually does that with MP3s. When you "request" a song you get a download link to a DRM free MP3 copy of the song which you then legally own. They are at the forefront of library usage.

Whatever gets you to sleep at night. So I take it we won't be reading the collected works of ptingler anytime soon?

Quote from: The Traveller;567348I have no difficulty with libraries. I do have difficulty with someone using the concept to excuse piracy.

I forgot that one on my list

Libraries have up until recently functioned in support of authors and copyrights. If you have 5 copies of book x, that's all that can be shared out at one time. Having 5 copies of book x and then digitally sharing 100,000 copies is something else.

It's been fairly obvious for a number of years that we need a new revenue model for most media; books, music, tv/movies.  What should that look like?

Quote from: The Traveller;567349Whatever gets you to sleep at night. So I take it we won't be reading the collected works of ptingler anytime soon?

Actually I do plan on releasing the gaming material I make under either OGL or CC license. But I guess the fact I haven't currently published anything and that others have already done so under OGL and CC rights means that you are unable to rationally think that people do indeed invest their own money in such a way. I also see after showing you that the library does indeed freely give you legal possession of some items you still think that only my personal publication of documents means anything.

Quote from: Lynn;567358Libraries have up until recently functioned in support of authors and copyrights. If you have 5 copies of book x, that's all that can be shared out at one time. Having 5 copies of book x and then digitally sharing 100,000 copies is something else.

It's similar to used bookstores.

At any given time there is:

(a) A level of demand for people who want to possess copies of work X; and
(b) The number of copies currently extant

When the level of demand is higher than the number of copies currently extant, more new copies of the work will be sold. If a creator wants to create a market for more new copies of a work, they need to either:

(1) Encourage people to collect their work;
(2) Increase the urgency people feel to consume their work

Both of these are traditionally achieved by improving the quality of their work. More recently, unethical content producers have used DRM to artificially force people to collect their work.

(Slightly different rules apply to live performances, of course.)

Used bookstores, libraries, and similar processes expedite the process by which people can move unwanted copies of a creative work to people who do want them. This is no different than when someone sells or donates the clothes that their baby has outgrown. Sure, Babies 'R Us would love it if everyone bought their baby clothes new, but the self-evident nature of property rights suggests that it would be absurd and unethical for Babies 'R Us to enforce some sort of Clothing Rights Management (CRM) in order to prevent people from reselling their baby clothes.

Piracy, OTOH, operates in a completely different fashion. It alleviates demand by increasing the number of extant copies. This directly undercuts the creator's ability to earn money by selling new copies.

This isn't a problem for Babies 'R Us because anyone selling baby clothes has to bear the same costs that Babies 'R Us does. But pirates don't: It costs time and/or money to create new work. The creators of that work have to pay those costs, but pirates don't. This gives the pirates an obvious and unfair advantage. Without the protections of copyright law, it would actively be a bad idea to create new works (instead of simply pirating existing ones).

Quote from: Lynn;567358I forgot that one on my list

Libraries have up until recently functioned in support of authors and copyrights. If you have 5 copies of book x, that's all that can be shared out at one time. Having 5 copies of book x and then digitally sharing 100,000 copies is something else.

And yet the scope of lending that major libraries do dwarfs any downloaded copy of rpg books. A recent Pew study found the average number of e-books borrowed in the U.S. is 29 a year. (Non e-book readers were found to borrow an average of 20 books a year.) Per Public Lending Right in the UK alone the top borrowed author for 2010-2011 was James Patterson at over 2 million copies of his books lent out. But of course, it's okay to read a book for free if you give it back. What if someone downloads James Patterson reads it on their iPad and then deletes it after they've read it? Have they done anything different than the person who borrowed it from the library? Of course not, but you guys already knew that.

Quote from: StormBringer;567360It's been fairly obvious for a number of years that we need a new revenue model for most media; books, music, tv/movies.  What should that look like?

Plenty of people make a lot of money of works that are not in copyright. If you want to make long-term money, you need to look at how people sell Shakespeare rather than how they sell Disney films.

Quote from: StormBringer;567360It's been fairly obvious for a number of years that we need a new revenue model for most media; books, music, tv/movies.  What should that look like?

Steam and Kickstarter.

Steam makes it abundantly clear that plenty of people are still willing to pay for creative work if they're sold a product they want in a convenient fashion, at a reasonable price point, without being crippled by DRM, and with a fair share of the revenue going to the creator.

(In a perfect world, Steam wouldn't come with any DRM whatsoever. But at least Steam's DRM generally doesn't reduce the value of the product.)

If that system does, in fact, collapse horribly then Kickstarter is the only option: Ransom the creative work until enough people pony up cash to cover the cost of creating it.

Quote from: ptingler;567383And yet the scope of lending that major libraries do dwarfs any downloaded copy of rpg books. A recent Pew study found the average number of e-books borrowed in the U.S. is 29 a year. (Non e-book readers were found to borrow an average of 20 books a year.)

My wife and I probably borrow 15-20 books a month from the library. Most of those are mysteries for my wife. If we did not borrow them, we certainly would not buy them. They are read once and most would never be read again -- buying them would be a waste of money. We do spend money on non-fiction books, however, but in most cases we've checked the book out of the library and found it useful enough to want a copy of our own.