COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Though not strictly within the letter of the law, I'm sure, I do try to live within the spirit of the law. To that end, I've always felt the important thing about copyrights was to lay claim to one's intellectual property such that if money were to be made from an idea, that the originator would receive that money and/or the credit for their work.

In many gaming situations, however, we find the most important aspect is the ability to disseminate and share information free of charge, and as long as no one tries to make a profit there, we should be fine. That is why I do not - and cannot - charge people for the time I spend developing my website, nor do I ask for monetary compensation for sending out ideas or the like.

Sometimes one wonders where this information is coming from, anyway. I mean, it's true a lot of information on my AD&D website is based upon TSR's publications, and I gladly give them credit - and blame - for much of it. But do they own Fireball - a magic spell that creates a ball of fire? How can they? Surely, the idea, even if by legal circumstances it may belong to them, was not theirs to begin with, nor are many of the spells, creatures, or concepts they have lifted from earlier works of fiction and mythology of their own making, morally speaking, though I have no idea about legally speaking. So where do we assign credit? Truly, it becomes a job in and of itself just to try to track down the actual intellect that originated these gems, and a separate legal job to find who may actually hold the copyrights. All of this is quite beyond me, I assure you.

It is my hope that no one will be offended if I lift material from some game or website and do not give it proper credit, or do not give the authors their rightful due for their work. More often than not, I simply don't know whom to thank, and it isn't a deliberate snub on my part. Believe me, if money were involved, I would make a concerted effort to find out who, what, when, where, why, etc., and give all the proper credit they deserve, but to do that, as I mentioned, takes work, and work on that level detracts from the very point of the game - for me, anyway.

If you see something on my page that you feel I need yet to give proper credit or consideration, please let me know what information, why you think you own the item in question, what line of credit you need appended to satisfy you, and I will either comply or delete the information. I have no desire to take what is not mine for the purposes of monetary gain, and I hope, as a gamer yourself, you will understand and agree the need to be unfettered in that regard.

You may note that I have placed copyright information at the bottom of many of my articles. Whether this is legally binding, I couldn't tell you for sure. It may be incomplete since I do not include a specific day. Too often, such articles are revised months later, anyway, but I maintain the original month of publication to the web, and if need be, one can assume the lack of any specific day means the last day of that month. Thus, anyone beating that time would have the copyright. Of course, the only reason I do this at all is to give me some measure of assurance that no one else tries to publish my material in order to make a profit on my work. If they wish to publish it as a 'free of charge' consideration for gaming purposes, I'm cool with that.

I would prefer, however, that if someone liked an article of mine and wanted to publish it on their site, that they would, instead, simply link to it. The reason for this is because articles are often revised, and with a link, the visitor will be assured of having the latest, updated version of my thoughts on any particular matter.

If a web master still wishes to post the article - in whole or in part - to their own site, they may do so, of course, but I request they place a link to my site to give my site credit for the work. You may do this by copying and pasting the following html text at the bottom of any article.

<P><CENTER><A HREF="http://frontiernet.net/~jamesstarlight" TARGET="_top">General Starlight's Fantasy Roleplaying Game Page</A><BR>(This Is The Website Where This Article Originally Appeared)</CENTER>

It would more or less look like this at the bottom of the article:

Or you may place my banner there instead, if you wish.

<P><CENTER>A HREF="http://frontiernet.net/~jamesstarlight" TARGET="_top"><IMG BORDER=0 SRC="http://www.frontiernet.net/~jimbeach/OrlantiaLogo.gif" ALT="Orlantia Logo" HEIGHT=60 WIDTH=468></A><BR><A HREF="http://frontiernet.net/~jamesstarlight">Article Originally From General Starlight's Fantasy Roleplaying Game Page</A></CENTER>

It would more or less look like this at the bottom of the article:

However you do it, I would appreciate it if you dropped me an email to let me know about your site, and what article you borrowed. Thank you.

Email Jim Your Comments (Send Praise, Critique, Complaints, Suggestions, Ideas, Corrections, or Submissions).

There are other places where I have stated something as "posted" rather than copyrighted. This is because I felt too much of the work was directly lifted from the original source - without much in the way of alterations or contribution on my part - and though I may not have given them credit, it was obvious to me from whence it came and would probably be obvious to all that read it. The 2nd edition AD&D shopping lists, for example, follow the PHB and DMG pretty closely, and though the prices have been altered to fit my world's economics, the lists are not original creations on my part - even with a few omissions or additions. Hence they are "Posted" and not "Copyrighted."

In any event, I actually hope that no one is reading this line as I'd rather you be a gamer trying to have fun, looking around to see the cool things on my website, sharing information for free, and not worrying too much about such legal issues as they can suck the fun out of anything - unless you are actually trying to make money with this hobby, in which case you probably should be reading this. Still, if you are reading this, I suppose you have your reasons.

So, to reiterate, if you think I need to do more about giving credit, or I need to do more with copyrights, please let me know where and I'll try. Thank you.

If you'd like to email me any comments you may have on this material, feel free to do so.

Email Jim Your Comments (Send Praise, Critique, Complaints, Suggestions, Ideas, Corrections, or Submissions).

© February of 2000
by
James L.R. Beach
Waterville, MN 56096