Hello,

Although I was against opening this forum when Peter and I discussed it several months ago, now that it is here, I feel the need to vent some long held feelings.

This debate has engendered deeply entrenched positions on both sides.

One of my personal complaints is that there does not seem to be any desire on the part of NRC or CGI to resolve this quickly.

I pose a question to Robin:

Have you (or your legal council) met with CGI since the delivery of the letter terminating the contract to get them to cease producing Harn products?

I pose a question to CGI:

If you claim that disputes must be taken to arbitration before the creator can cancel the contract, have you made any attempts to engage an arbitrator and arrange a meeting with NRC?

I think until the two sides start seriously talking, the fans should consider a boycott of both sides products and the temporary suspension of all fanon material. This will hit them where it hurts, the pocketbook.

Remember...

The Harn fan base is small. Demographically, we are much older than the average gamer crowd. The entire community has been slowly shrinking over the last ten years. The dispute between NRC and CGI has done nothing to increase the fan base, in fact, it has probably eroded it.

If this dispute continues, the winner might find themselves holding the clear, undisputed sole rights to an intellectual property with no customers.

Wouldn't that be a b*tch...finally being declared right but having no one to celebrate your success with. It will be the very definition of a pyrrhic victory.

TTYL

Kerry Mould

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Well, my days of taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle. - Mal, Firefly.

Feh.

Mr. Mould is correct for BOTH parties concerned, as well as the gamebase.
Most of us Harniacs are older than the D20 group, have a bit more money to play with, etc. BUT I take a bit more pragmatic view of things, the competition between CGI and Kelestia is to benefit of the consumer, WE can determine which products are usable for their gaming needs. I see that is a good thing.

I echo this. We're older, which means we tend to have more money to spend on such things, and both sides know most of us buy everything they each put out.

But it is absolutely true that escalation of this dispute into the realm of the customer is exactly the wrong thing to do. As I wrote elsewhere, I found Robin's post offensive, and utterly counterproductive. His logic is that those buying from one or the other have a 50% chance of committing a crime (dubious, but we'll let that go), and those of us buying from both are committing a crime. Since not one of us can know for certain which party would prevail before the law (not the same thing as being right), the rational response is to stop buying from both parties until the dispute is resolved. The question is, how much of the customer base erodes in the years it would take?

I'm assuming this is not Robin's intent, but sometimes there are consequences to staking out a strong position in quicksand.

Law and ethics only partially overlap. I'm not even intrested who is right. I'm only intrested in having a living Hârn community for future gamers. As I see such a healthy community can not survive if a clear and legally binding agreement is not reached on the Intellectual property rights concerning Kethira and Hârn.

Therefore the way I see it since Hârn will die anyway if the agreement is not reached, why not force the issue and either open the gridlock once and for all or just kill the bugger quickly. That way Hârn would at least go out with dignity.

This leads to following:



As I already posted elsewhere this is my take on the situation as well. Such escalation simply can not be in the intrests of anyone involved. Taking the high ground is to abstain from buiyng from anyone until this is resolved. I myself am in a situation where I do not need any more Hârnstuff at all. I mostly have bought to keep a noble project from dying. Unfortunately I'm not intrested in looking after the intrests of future gamers if I might face legal action (No matter how impropable, or down right impossible.) for doing it.

I don't need more Kethira related products. I was mostly buying to give future gamers a chance to discover Hârn as well. Now I cease buying until this dispute is settled in a legally binding matter, if that kills Hârn which I value greatly, so be it.

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Victory, Destiny!

Stop buying Hârn products or be labeled a criminal? Done!

I'm not wasting any more money on a world without future. It's obvious that the end of HârnWorld is nigh unless a conclusion is reached. No conclusion => no publishing rights => no products => no future.

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"The greatest sport ever: the Biathlon - cross-country skiing interspersed with rounds of shooting Russians." - HierophantX on Finnish winter sports

Quote from another thread.



You took the words right out from my mouth, but left the stinging aftertaste there, countryman. And like the child in middle of divorce, I don't want to be either bullied or honey-talked into either side. From where I stand, Hârn wouldn't exists without the effort from both parties. Unless a conclusion is reached in co-operative manner or this is taken to the court, I'll give the both parties a change not to take my money if they feel it's ethically unclean. It's my money and I'll do what I please with it.

Although,



This is pretty much my view as well; I have enough Hârn stuff to last a lifetime. I don't need it anymore; I like reading it, but watch me not rolling in tar and coverning myself with feathers for not having more.

I'm tempted not to buy anything until the matter is settled. However, I want to give the other party a fair change to state their points and then watch the dispute for a while before doing that.

And last and certainly not least; I feel sorry for the folks who have produced the great fanon-stuff and even paid for it from their own wallets. Using them as a stepping stone in this farce is a slap to the collective of fanbase. I fully expect an apology from Robin's party on this one.

- Merten. Also known as the king, Customer.

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Merten at iki dot fi
Currently on hiatus of unknown length.

Hear, hear.

I too would like to hear CGI's view, but NRC staked out his position clearly, and it's one that suggests the tone he must have taken with CGI. No wonder things broke down.

The answer to this is yes. I have sent multiple registered letters to CGI requesting and requiring that they cease and desist their illegal activities forthwith.

I received a registered letter from a lawyer retained by CGI making similar demands on myself. However, once I informed the lawyers that I had in my possession certain documents, I never heard from those lawyers again.

Mr. Dalgliesh and myself have also exchanged a number of eMails in an effort to resolve the issue. The only way it can be resolved is by entering into a new agreement. It has seemed to me that such an agreement might have been reachable except for disagreement on one point. I certainly will not yield this one point, not should anyone expect this of me. The point is:

If CGI is going to publish my work, then they must pay me a mutually agreed royalty.

CGI would not agree to this principle. This is the point at which negotiations 'broke off'.

I should point out that I also offered CGI a 'royalty holiday' and a 'quit claim' of damages and back royalties & payments, but their position was simply that they refused to pay me any money whatsoever, ever.

I have, by the way, also offered CGI exclusive rights to Harn & Ivinia (with the exception of Melderyn), shared copyright on 'core HarnWorld materials' and exclusive copyright for CGI on new Harn material that I have not written (while I would, of course retain sole copyright on materials that CGI have never touched). None of this means anything if CGI is unwilling to pay any royalties at all.

This is how it stands.

If anyone thinks I should have negotiated a new deal under these circumstances, by all means speak up?

This is a reasonable position. However, it has been suggested that CGI was to pay a certain fixed fee per month as a royalty. So my question is was this a fixed royalty or one based on sales?

If it's the latter, I find it hard to believe that there's a problem. On the other hand, if it's a fixed royalty which is not tied to sales, then I have to question the validity. After all, should not an author be paid on the basis of units sold?

Good question.

The original contract (which I terminated) specified that a mutually agreed and amendable royalty be paid. While one may argue about the rates (CGI unilatterally amended the rates on several occasions btw), it is hard to argue against a fixed fee to be paid to the author each time the publisher sells a unit.

The original contract also specified a 'floor payment' level. If CGI failed to pay a certain amount ($250 per month) for a sufficient period of time (six months) then I would have the right to terminate the contract. The purpose of this 'floor payment' was to establish a threshold where it would be clear that CGI was simply doing me no good... failing to sell to adequately market or sell the products, or simply refusing to pay me. Whether the 'floor payment' was necessarily royalties, is a matter of debate. I believe (with legal advice) that while the floor payments could be recouped from royalties, the floor payment still had to be made. The contract was such that if this threshold was crossed for any given six month period, I would be allowed to demand the defecit or terminate the contract.

None of the proposals I made to CGI after termination included a 'floor payment' I was wiling to accept simple royalties. CGI has refused to pay me any royalties or fees in any form... ever. It has been my hope that public pressure would oblige CGI to 'modify' their position on this.

OK, so I understand that you claim CGI did not pay the floor royalty for a number of years.

I've also been around long enough to know those were the lean years, and that revenue must have been slim on Harn products. Allowing that CGI was foolish to guarantee payments in absence of revenues, I have this question.

Did CGI pay you royalties based on sales, or did they pay nothing at all?

During the period in question they paid nothing at all (while the exact duration of the period may be in question, it was certainly no less than three years). Furthermore, this was hardly the 'lean years'. This was the period in which Auran was paying both CGI and myself pretty respectable wads of cash. There were also, in all probability, sufficient revenues from sales of my work to pay me enough royalties to cover the 'floor-payments'.

So, if I correctly guage where your question is heading:

During this period CGI was certainly able to make the required floor payments, they chose not to. In fact TD has publically stated that he withheld all payments to 'punish' me.

So now we get to the root of this entire issue that being the fact that for some time the games creator has not been paid any royalties.

That we can understand and it probobly would have been better on your part to state that earlier in the day to stop a lot of confusion.

As for the issue of the copywright I think everyone also understands your point of veiw on that s well but did you ever stop and think of the damage that could cause?. Think about it the very game you created has the smallest fanbase of any other RPG out there but if this happened with any other game would its fans react as strongly as Harns fans, I think not, You created something Incredible and no-one wants to take that away from you with the joint copywrites. All they want to do is give credit to the Man who is responsible and as CGI was/is a part of that they feel compelled the same towards them.

Is it absolutely nesesary for you to drag your most loyal fans into this when all they want is a resolution. Or would you prefer for them to give you the Trudeu salute and walk away.

The Issue is the money and recognition you are due from CGI not the copywright, so just have the law either canadian or american figure it out and let the rest of us know.

I mean no disrespect by my comments but it is the simple truth

Steve Derflinger

As far as I know, the withdrawl of the copyright was to deprive CGI of the money they were not paying royalties on.

As far as you know the contract was cancelled becouse of royalty issues, well thats understandable. But is it nessesary for NRC to brow beat those who enjoy that which he created by harping on the copywright issue. Is that going to get him his money?. Is that going to stop CGI from producing Harn Material?. I dont think so. So why take it out on the Fans when they are the ones that keep the game alive.

By the way this forum for this discussion has been going for about 18 hrs notice that CGI has had no official statement for the very Fans I speak of.

This is probably a good point. I wanted and needed this debate, and I continued it from where it had already started: ie., on the issue of copyright notices on fanon. This is not where I would have chosen to start the debate. This debate is ostensibly quite simple, but it has the potential to become very large and complicated if people choose to make it so.

I also acknowledge that I began the issue badly, and for this I apologise. I have, until now, attempted to keep the public argument focused on a few significant points (from which all the other points naturally flow). However, it may be more realistic to air out all of the issues and see where the chips fall then.



This is another very good question. The short answer is, unfortunately, yes it is necessary. I have legal advice that the issue can only be settled through the 'court of public opinion'. That's you. Before the 'court' can settle the case, it has to hear the case. Any hope that the case will be settled by litigation or arbitration is, unfortunately, wishful thinking. A continued 'stand off' will, despite some peoples' views, eventually kill Harn.

All I can say is Mr Crossby thank you for your Honesty and candidness in answering my and others questions and hopefully it will not end with the death of Harn.

Although I suspect that this game no matter what happens will not die completely

Without knowing some of the particulars, it's impossible for this 'court' to 'hear the case.' That and only that is why you are seeing the refusal to take sides. You have stated elsewhere that either you or CGI are liars. But there are at least three other options. Either you, or CGI, or both, are instead mistaken. Refusing to take sides in no way implies that we are accusing you of lying or even of being mistaken. It only implies that we are ignorant of the full facts.

In the absence of any legal documents(1), here's one question to you from a juror sitting on this 'court pf public opinion': nearly all of my pre-2003 Hârn material contains a joint copyright statement that includes both the author and the publisher. This is extremely unusual. In a brief ten minute survey of my book and game shelf, I can find no other product with a similar copyright. Why was this done?

(1)I have seen some of a contract. I have not seen all of it.

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Cyril laugh at puny human!

Robin, if the court of public opinion had any force then I'm sure you would be paid the money owed you - and you and Columbia Games would be settled in a royalties paying arrangement similar to that which you have operated in the past.

Further you and CG would be allotted a huge grant of money and chained to a desk in front of your computers to produce more great Harn stuff (in big fancy houses with every amenity that your hearts could desire - but that you'd seldom partake of due to the love of your work producing Harn).

Unfortunately, the 'court of public opinion' has no such power, is of many minds as to what they prefer, and even those who believe you are probably in the right will probably succumb to temptation and buy from anyone who produces Harn content when the courts of law are unable to decide the issue.



Harn will live on in the hearts of many - even if not on the shelves or gaming stores.

I expect and hope that Harn will live on in better glory then that though.

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Member of the CoE (Council of Elitists)

That is an extremely good question and one to which I do not have a clear answer. In fact this may be a grey area. First, I should say that CGI and I may have vastly different opinions on this.

The first occurance of the double copyright notice occured in 1983. Columbia Games added their copyright to the textual material only after the editing process was complete and after I had given final approval to the product. It is interesting to note that CGI did not add a CGI copyright to the map. Until the addition, the whole product bore my sole copyright (the Harn Regional map, which is arguably the single work upon from which all subsequent works are derived, and which is certainly seminal has always displayed my sole copyright).

I sought legal advice at the time, because I was concerned.

There were and still are two factors. The first is that publishers often 'assume' the copyright in an agency role. Whoever holds the copyright has the responsibility to police it. CGI could not, for example send rude letters to violators if they did not hold some kind of agency.

The second factor, to which I have alluded is the licencing issue. The legal advice I received indicated that the contract (which at that point was a handshake) was regardless of copyright, a licence granted by me to CGI. Copyright notices could not change this. Most importantly, I had been personally guaranteed 'Creative Control'.

After that, it became the 'practice' to include shared copyright on the text and my sole copyright on maps etc., (anything that CGI did not get the 'last kick at').

In 1986, a new owner bought CGI and insisted that a written contract be implemented. This formalised the shared copyright, which is something to which I never would have agreed but for the termination clause which guarnteed me sole copyright (and all rights to the whole 'concept') upon any termination.

Have I answered the question? Probably not, but this is only because I don't know the answer.

Perhaps your impassioned speech here will encourage many to embargo CG and it's products out of pure desire for honor and righteousness. However, this would leave them without access to the printed articles they desire that CG is producing, undermine the products they have bought and either commit them to a different product sold through your website, cease purchasing any product from anyone or else abandon Harn entirely.

This is the opposite effect that most of the consumers desire. They want more Harn product - not less. Only a legal settlement/result that places all Harn product in the hands of a legal supplier that continues to produce the product achieves this. I think that most would agree that a 'public opinion' win that leaves that public without access to some or all of the current/promised content is undesirable.

Not only must you be paid but somehow CG product must also continue to be produced as well. A solution that fails to achieve that or some reasonable substitute is not an acceptable solution to most.

I see no way to achieve this in the 'court of public opinion' and would highly urge a 'court of law' solution.

I can see no reason that if one can sue to change 'under god' in the pledge of allegiance and 'in god we trust' on the US currency that a legal contract can not be enforced to acquire money and materials legally due to you.

Perhaps the 'court of public opinion' will provide a solution but I have my doubts...

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Member of the CoE (Council of Elitists)

You haven't answered it, but you certainly have shone some light on that patch of ground where one needs to start digging to find it.

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Cyril laugh at puny human!

I agree. The object here is not to reduce the amount of material being produced. I would like CGI to continue producing material, but not without a fair contract. A fair contract is one by which I am paid a fair return for my work. In fact, I would like to licence more than one company to expand development Kethira. CGI refuses to pay me anything whatsoever. I would like to expand development into other media, but all of these plans are made far more difficult by CGI's refusal to acknowledge my basic right to compensation for my work. Does that sound fair to you? Does that sound like a position you can support?

Thank you.


I assume this means you've been told of the hurdles to actually bringing the suit in the first place and the economic pressure the fans/customers can bring is the only thing which will force CGI to come to the table?


We'd all like to see CGI keep publishing. However, payment is a pretty standard part of a contract, and I shall accept aguendo your assertion that you have not been paid.

So why is this? The use of the word "punish" above implies a certain malice, and I would prefer to keep this discussion away from ascribing base motives to either side. Were there practical, economic, or legal reasons for non-payment? Did CGI sell materials and then fail to pay royalties? If so, why?