Wizards of the Coast silently edit their latest OGL update

A D&D nerd on Twitter, @Maatlock noticed that Wizards of the Coast had edited their Update on the Open Game License post of Friday the 13th.

It’s a tiny tweak, but it’s not been acknowledged. The original document said;

The license back language was intended to protect us and our partners from creators who incorrectly allege that we steal their work simply because of coincidental similarities (lots of third-party content includes dungeons… and dragons). As we continue to invest in the game that we love and move forward with partnerships in film, television, and digital games, that risk is simply too great to ignore.

Now the page reads;

The license back language was intended to protect us and our partners from creators who incorrectly allege that we steal their work simply because of coincidental similarities. As we continue to invest in the game that we love and move forward with partnerships in film, television, and digital games, that risk is simply too great to ignore.

The aside about other creators using dungeons and dragons in their content has been dropped. Perhaps Hasbro didn’t even want to cede that point.

A great strength of the internet is that helpful documents can be kept up to date easily. In fact, regulated industries such as finance and health in the UK should inspect and make appropriate edits to anything they publish.

Wizards, however, are in the spotlight and wrestling to restore trust. A silent edit may not have been the best way to do that.

Geek Native, a mere blog run as a hobby, is hardly an example of excellence, but even I learnt to maintain a corrections log. It would have been trivial for Wizards’ PR or legal team to include a little timestamped note at the end of the page to say it had been edited for clarity. However, they may also have thought the change was not significant enough to call out.

Quick Links

• An Update on the Open Game License (OGL)