Free but not worthless

[Ry]

My last two projects (E6 and Raising the Stakes) have received a lot of attention, at least for free .pdfs (perhaps two dozen groups either running E6 games now or planning to do so soon). 

My next project is also envisioned as a free .pdf, but unlike E6 and Raising the Stakes, this will be a collection of microfiction / game content rather than rules.  It will also be much longer, although I could release it in smaller portions as well.  The purpose of the project is creating a fully open fantasy iconography, and do my best to give up rights to it (i.e. allow use by others even if I am not given credit).

So this brings me to the issue of strategy: How do you give something away without creating the assumption that it is worthless?

[Jason Morningstar]

It sounds to me like you are on the right track - an active community of players communicates a certain level of professionalism, quality, and value.

I have not checked to see if/how you are licensing your stuff, but an open and extensible license (Like some liberal flavor of Creative Commons in your case) also encourages people to embrace and adapt your work, which can only further the perception of value. 

[Justin D. Jacobson]

Getting a nice piece of artwork (even if it's just a professionally design logo) goes a long way.

[David Artman]

Out of curiosity, why not publish via a wiki, if you want it open and extensible? That has a few solid benefits:
1) You can lock the pages that have "canon" content which isn't to be violated (without ruining the overall world).
2) Others needn't channel their thoughts through you (or through independent publishing) because they can create extensions right on the wiki.
3) You can setup ad banners specific to your community's interests, which will generate a trickle of revenue even though your content is "free."

PDF is, intentionally, a "baked in" file format, resistant to revision without an external editor. If others want to add to your content, they must use the same (or a similar) editor, to match style or formatting elements. Further, they have to "bake" their own PDFs, too, which you would then... what? Host for download? Link on your PDF download sites...?

Why not just have them pop it into the wiki...?
David

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Ryan,

No one really knows why some things that are free gain enormously in value, whereas others that are also free lose enormously in value. My take is that both type of item (e.g. CD vs. PDF download) and specific content are both involved, but whatever calculus puts those two together, I don't know.

I suggest that you use your best judgment as a potential consumer: would you, yourself, value this thing if it were free and available to you? Sure, you're a sample size of one, but you're an important one - you are your own best indicator of the target audience. Identify them (or that part of you to which this object speaks) and see how you can promote it and indicate its value accordingly - to that audience, not to anyone else.

I'll use myself as an example: if I were to bust my butt to produce a set of fantasy material that was genuinely good at the range and level that you're describing, I'd want to get paid for doing it. Genuinely good fantasy material is not common.

But I hasten to say, the above paragraph is not advice. It's an example of one person self-consulting to see what would be most satisfying as a creator and publisher, for such an item. My hope is that you will similarly self-consult, and it doesn't matter at all whether your conclusion differs from mine. It'll be yours, and you should proceed from it accordingly.

Best, Ron

[Ry]

Well, there's 2 reasons I'm looking to do the .pdf thing instead of the wiki thing: First is that I have an idea for a skeleton that others could hang things off of, but I'd like to make sure that I can produce the whole skeleton.  

But the bigger reason is that I don't want to take on the mantle of community management (authorship I can do, social management not so much).

[Ry]

Hi Ron, interesting you should bring up the topic of self-consultation.  For the longest time I have been developing this project as something that would one day be my explosive debut into fantasy writing.  Then, I thought, later down the line when I had some credibility, I could put something out into the Creative Commons for people who had (like me) been inspired by something proprietary and then had to write awkwardly around it. 

About a year ago all of that changed when I read a book called the Compass of Zen and an old friend of mine and I talked about possessions and possessiveness.  I have been in the past extremely possessive of what I'd worked on, and yet never satisfied by it.  I would work endlessly trying to perfect a given project, and this was a massively isolating force in my life.  With E6 and Raising the Stakes, giving my best ideas about game design away has been an immensely satisfying experience:  As a result of that, I've made new friends, expanded my gaming group, and connected with other gamers instead of spending yet another day at my desk trying to square the circle.  Now I see my old Skyborn notes poking out of a drawer, and I realized that I could do something that I felt would be good for the community and which I wish someone else had done years ago.

As to your other point, my main concern is that the format I'm thinking of would benefit someone being able to leaf through it rather than necessarily start on page 1.  If I want to produce the first major burst of this project as a (skeletal) whole, that's a big hurdle right there.

[iago]

So this brings me to the issue of strategy: How do you give something away without creating the assumption that it is worthless?

By treating it as if it's not "just a free thing".  Produce it solidly and well.  Make it look like you could charge money, but you're being awesome and giving it away instead.

I think this is a component of why Fate got legs when we put the free "2.0" version of it up online.  We put a production effort into it that made it look good, and got several bits of feedback along those lines -- "I would have paid for this!"

[xenopulse]

Fred is right on. When I found FATE, I thought it looked extremely well done for a free product.

And, well, it had Aspects, and they kicked my brain into a different sphere of existence

But I'm not sure I'd have worked my way through the document to find the Aspects if it had looked crummier, didn't have the graphics, and so on.

And as you can see, establishing a fan base with a free product has worked extremely well for Evil Hat.

[Ry]

Sound advice.  I'm going to work up a solid draft of what I'm talking about, then return here with something I can hopefully get production advice on.

[rekyl]

Personally I think that all things good usually comes freely or atleast payed for in another way than money (that kinda sounds wrong doesn't it?). Like the best games Ive ever played are those where I read the backs of published games I couldnt afford as a kid (or as an adult for that matter) and tried to make my own as close as possible to the original. I still have a game I wrote when I was a teenager based on the swedish game Kult.

Ive had some thoughts concerning leaflet RPG's for a game convention. The concept is this - I'll make the best, short, game ever (this is starting to sound like a great plan doesn't it?) - print it with the help of my union (who owns a printing press and would give me a really good price if not for free) and then hand it out at next years convention in Gothenburg. A free game for everyone...
(if not that one could try to print ads in it... wouldnt that be cool just like the paper Metro, fund it through ads Shit thats a pretty cool idea... theres tons of stuff rich geeks like to buy if only they knew about them )

Anyway my point is that it seems pointless to work with something and not even get payed enough for bills when one could just DO something and be happy with it, with the creative work and the joy it gives others.

/Jens

PS Seriously, that ad-funded roleplaying thing sounds really fucking great... someone out there whos tried this before (there must be)... if not this is the "Handsome Jens Method of Acquiring Insane Amounts of Money" from here on, ok?

[Grumpy]

I'm affraid that to have advertisers alone pay for the production of the game, you would need to distribute more than you're likely to (although the fact that it's free and distributed at cons over a longer period of time than a free newspaper makes me doubt...).

I love the idea, though.

[David Artman]

I'm affraid that to have advertisers alone pay for the production of the game, you would need to distribute more than you're likely to (although the fact that it's free and distributed at cons over a longer period of time than a free newspaper makes me doubt...).

I love the idea, though.

Great... but I don't think you quite got the idea, if it's my reference to ad banners on a wiki. He's already proposing a free, "open source" product but, within the expansions that accrue, he wants a core rule set that is inviolate and under his control (right, Ryan?). Having an ad revolver plug-in on your wiki is trivial to accomplish, and it would make a "trickle of revenue" as I said; where as a free PDF is a trickle of constant costs: centralized updating labor, web hosting, and bandwidth. So, in short, for this project concept, it's the only way to really make a steady revenue (ad placement in PDFs is usually one-shot payment, for-trade-in-kind, or payment-per-sale, at best).

As for Ryan's objections to the wiki format:

First is that I have an idea for a skeleton that others could hang things off of, but I'd like to make sure that I can produce the whole skeleton.

Reread my post:

...
1) You can lock the pages that have "canon" content or rules which isn't to be violated (without ruining the overall world).

(Bold text just added, for clarity.)

So your first open is a non-objection: Protected Pages, User-Editing-Restricted Pages, Admin- (i.e. You-) Only Pages: there's several ways to control who can edit a wiki, up to and including setting it so that only you can do so.

As for:

But the bigger reason is that I don't want to take on the mantle of community management (authorship I can do, social management not so much).

Only you can be sure of your own capabilities, but I doubt you'd have much "management" of community to do. Perhaps set the whole wiki to "Only Creator, Editors, and Admin may Edit" (a set of settings, usually) and you'd immediately eliminate all of the "he's screwing with my sandbox" arguments. A few other settings (and maybe some trusted users with Edit power) and you could end up with very LITTLE "community management" to do because it's all handled by permissions and registrations, a "ratifying" body of editors, and some anti-vandalism diligence. Or maybe you partner with someone else, to let him or her handle the community while you focus on the game?

In short... I don't think your stated objections to a wiki are really that valid or problematic... but the issues you will face as the central gateway for collaborative PDF development is significant (and a LOT of "community management" too). And if you leave it to other folks to just produce and host their own add-ons to your game... and it's open source... well, let's just say I bet someone makes their own wiki to have a more effective collaboration environment.

Wikis were invented for precisely the sort of project and end product that you have in mind. PDFs were invented to create non-volatile documents which can represent discrete drafts and official or legal final publications (and help track review and commentary, with full Acrobat, but that's incidental). You are, frankly, using a hammer to chop carrots for the stone soup you're preparing for the townsfolk....

My 2¢, YMMV, DWYW;
David

[Ry]

He's already proposing a free, "open source" product but, within the expansions that accrue, he wants a core rule set that is inviolate and under his control (right, Ryan?). Having an ad revolver plug-in on your wiki is trivial to accomplish, and it would make a "trickle of revenue" as I said; where as a free PDF is a trickle of constant costs: centralized updating labor, web hosting, and bandwidth. So, in short, for this project concept, it's the only way to really make a steady revenue (ad placement in PDFs is usually one-shot payment, for-trade-in-kind, or payment-per-sale, at best).  As for Ryan's objections to the wiki format:

First is that I have an idea for a skeleton that others could hang things off of, but I'd like to make sure that I can produce the whole skeleton.

Reread my post:

...
1) You can lock the pages that have "canon" content or rules which isn't to be violated (without ruining the overall world).

So your first open is a non-objection: Protected Pages, User-Editing-Restricted Pages, Admin- (i.e. You-) Only Pages: there's several ways to control who can edit a wiki, up to and including setting it so that only you can do so.

As for:

But the bigger reason is that I don't want to take on the mantle of community management (authorship I can do, social management not so much).

Only you can be sure of your own capabilities, but I doubt you'd have much "management" of community to do. Perhaps set the whole wiki to "Only Creator, Editors, and Admin may Edit" (a set of settings, usually) and you'd immediately eliminate all of the "he's screwing with my sandbox" arguments. A few other settings (and maybe some trusted users with Edit power) and you could end up with very LITTLE "community management" to do because it's all handled by permissions and registrations, a "ratifying" body of editors, and some anti-vandalism diligence. Or maybe you partner with someone else, to let him or her handle the community while you focus on the game?

In short... I don't think your stated objections to a wiki are really that valid or problematic... but the issues you will face as the central gateway for collaborative PDF development is significant (and a LOT of "community management" too). And if you leave it to other folks to just produce and host their own add-ons to your game... and it's open source... well, let's just say I bet someone makes their own wiki to have a more effective collaboration environment.

Wikis were invented for precisely the sort of project and end product that you have in mind.

I'm starting to see that.  I'd still likely hit a "codify" stage and release a .pdf at that point (i.e. here's 120 locked entries). 

As for rules, I'm planning systemless for now.  I haven't received my copy of Dictionary of Mu but something along those lines.

What I'm planning is a project with these properties:

Small in scope,
Systemless,
Containing single-page
Interrelated entries
With Distinctive flavor
In a pre-agreed format and context,
Containing Capital "S" Situations
That can be explored in multiple game systems,
Is filtered through a central authority,
With veto power,
Then edited extensively, and finally
Released under the OGL listing it as 100% OGL material, then
Released again at the same moment with a Creative Commons Attribution license,
For free.

[David Artman]

I'm starting to see that.  I'd still likely hit a "codify" stage and release a .pdf at that point (i.e. here's 120 locked entries).

Cool, glad I could turn you around. 120 Protected Pages is a nice framework onto which to hang just about any site: your Main Page navigation and sidebar navigation can all be in place, any second-order navigation pages you want can be in place, and key Category pages can be setup and locked. Oh, yeah... and the base-rules content in place and locked.

David