Licensing vs. Sponsorship

[richardpendry]

Hi all

Okay, let me first say that in keeping with FK rules this thread will not involve any discussion about prices. Please keep it that way.

I simply want to say a few things about Flash game licensing and about this new buzzword "sponsorship". This has been discussed before on this forum, but reading this thread today along with an experience I had this week has prompted me to try to make a few things clear.

For those who don't know me I'm one of the guys behind Mousebreaker . We develop our own games and license them to clients, and we are also a games portal who licenses games from developers, so in some ways I'm able to see both sides of this issue.

Licensing
When you license a game, you are effectively giving permission to someone else to use it. There are many ways to do this - you can allow them to use it for one day on one URL, or you can allow them to use it forever on as many websites as they want. Or anywhere in between. And the money you charge for the license depends very much on the kind of use you are allowing them, and the number of sites it will appear on.

Also you can license your game exclusively or non-exclusively, meaning that you promise not to license it elsewhere or not. If you license a game non-exclusively to a site then you are free to license it to as many other sites as you wish, earning a license fee from each site.

Most importantly...

*** If you do not protect your game by locking it to a client's URL, then it will be picked up by many other games sites who will use your work without paying a license fee. MAKE SURE YOU USE URL CHECKING. ***

"Unlimited use for a set period"
sc2071 mentioned this on another thread , saying that a couple of sites wanted "unlimited use for a set period". If you grant some one this permission you are allowing them to distribute your game far and wide over the internet, allowing any other site to use/host it, albeit for a "set period". If you agree to this, your game will appear all over the place - and you will only have been paid once. Please be aware of this, and CHARGE ACCORDINGLY.

"Sponsorship"
Several games portals now offer "sponsorship" deals. They will pay you an amount of money if you will allow them to distribute your game all over the web - with their logo plastered all over it. Again - if you do this please be aware of what you are doing and CHARGE ACCORDINGLY.

In my opinion - and it is only my opinion - game "sponsorship" is a very poor deal for any developer. As part of the deal they will insist that you can't publish your game anywhere on the web without their logo.

You are basically granting them a license to distribute your game globally with their logo, and agreeing not to license it elsewhere (without their logo). It's a rip-off.


I realise I'm in danger of sounding like a wise old man here - and many of you will know all this already. But I think it's worth stating again and again:

* PROTECT YOUR WORK OR IT WILL APPEAR EVERYWHERE BEYOND YOUR CONTROL

* THINK VERY CAREFULLY ABOUT WHETHER YOU WANT TO GET YOUR GAME SPONSORED (AND HOW MANY SITES IT WILL APPEAR ON) - OR WHETHER YOU WANT TO LICENSE IT, AND UNDER WHAT TERMS.

* CHARGE ACCORDINGLY.

Cheers
Rich