‘People are leaving the game’: Dungeons & Dragons fans revolt against new restrictions; The Guardian, January 13, 2023

 Alaina Demopoulos, The Guardian; ‘People are leaving the game’: Dungeons & Dragons fans revolt against new restrictions

"It’s been a tough week for Dungeons & Dragons fans.

The reins were pulled in on users who come up with their own storylines and new characters, creating legions of imaginary worlds that spin off of the original fantasy roleplaying game. They have also been able to make and sell products required to play or based on the game under an open game license (OGL) agreement.

But as Gizmodo first reported, a leaked new agreement drafted by Wizards of the Coast (WoTC), the Hasbro subsidiary that owns D&D, threatens to “tighten” the OGL that has been in place since the early 2000s. It would grantWoTC the ability to “make money off of these products without paying the person who made it” and companies that make over $750,000 will have to start paying Hasbro a 25% cut of their earnings."

Why Protecting Recipes Under Intellectual Property Law May Leave a Bad Taste in Your Mouth; Above The Law, August 27, 2018

Tom Kulik, Above The Law; Why Protecting Recipes Under Intellectual Property Law May Leave a Bad Taste in Your Mouth

[Kip Currier: Interesting and useful information--in case you're thinking about monetizing your own BBQ rub...or marketing Grandma's secret recipe for fill-in-the-blank.] 

"What may be pleasing to the palate, however, is not always acceptable under intellectual property law."

THE STAR WARS VIDEO THAT BAFFLED YOUTUBE'S COPYRIGHT COPS; Wired, August 2, 2017

Jeremy Hsu, Wired; THE STAR WARS VIDEO THAT BAFFLED YOUTUBE'S COPYRIGHT COPS

"Still, the Auralnauts say they have few options to fight what they view as unfair claims on their content. Koonce suggested possible Content ID improvements that could prevent the same false claims from being repeatedly filed against the same video by different claimants. “People need to protect their IP, but don’t give them all the power," he says.

A smarter profit-sharing system would differentiate better between, say, a video of Queen performing “Bohemian Rhapsody” or the same song playing in the background of someone's wedding video. “What is needed is a more nuanced approach to how stuff gets monetized,” says Robert Lyons, a former digital media executive who is now a visiting lecturer at Northeastern University in Boston.

In any case, Lyons suggests that the Auralnauts video has a very good chance of being protected under fair use legal doctrine—the legal concept that allows for music and video parodies, among other exceptions to copyright infringement. “I think that a mere five seconds of the title’s music in a work that clearly is transformative and [that] poses no threat to the commercial potential of the original work would have a very strong fair use defense,” Lyons says."