Camila Chediak

In 2000, Wizards of the Coast (“Wizards”), the creators of Dungeons & Dragons, faced a red pill or blue pill scenario. On the one hand, Wizards could continue to build its Dungeons & Dragons game, while carefully preserving its intellectual property rights. On the other hand, Wizards could risk or even waive its intellectual property rights by allowing third parties, especially the players, to use the Dungeons & Dragons’ intellectual property for their own creations with few limitations, allowing its players to help expand the D&D franchise. Wizards’ chose the second option – to limit its claims over its intellectual property and allow third parties to create their own custom D&D content. A Dungeons & Dragons empire was born. Twenty-three years later, we examine Wizards’ choice and its impact. In early January of this year, the gaming industry was outraged over a leaked document published by pop culture news outlet io9. The document was a draft of the most recent version of Wizards’ Open Game License, or OGL.