I was, at first, not understanding what Beff was getting at but as I think more on it I see he does have a point in that there does become a legal issue. If I understand him correctly, while we cannot prevent thieves from doing their thing if they are intent on stelaing, we do not want to give legal license for them to do it.
What do I mean?
Let's say we get a domain and pay for a neutral site for our group board portal. Unless members get together to form a company to pay for this site, the business that sells the domain is going to assume the "person" (Let's call him Bob. (no offense to any Bob's out there).) who makes the actual purchase is considered the "owner" of that site.
So the domain company assumes Bob is the owner since Bob made the purchase and so forwards the passwords and legal authority to do what he wants with his newfound space.
If we do not set something up as to what Bob's actual responsibilities are and what the relationship is between all the boards on this portal, we could be leaving ourselves open to some nasty legal issues should Bob become a vindictive bastard for whatever slight happens.
Seeing the hurt feelings across the boards on some issues, it's not a hard thing to imagine someone or some group eventually pissing off Bob.
The question becomes, what is Bob's character?
While not picking on TGC, I will use them as an example. TGC makes a clear distinction between owner and administration. The admins may have access to certain areas and can make modifications to the board but ultimate authority rests in the owner. I do not presume to know how ownership of the content on TGC is distributed but the question does remain: Unless something is determined beforehand, I would think that legally all content (not copywritten) belongs to the owner and theirs to modify, delete and use as they see fit.
Now one may say, but there's not going to be roleplays or much information on the 'Unity' board for Bob (should he become vindictive) to actually threaten.
But what if Bob names the Unity Portal site, "Roleplaying Legacies"? What if Roleplaying Legacies is registered as a legal entity?
Remember, if you are a community that hosts other "groups" from other sites, these groups must conform to the main community's rules and regs.
So TRF, TGC, Epics, GOTOR.. whatever, if they associate themselves with Roleplaying Legacies, then do they fall under whatever rules, bylaws, regs Bob sets for Roleplaying Legacies then? If nothing is written and no standards in place, Bob may very well claim ownership of material on boards associating with what is legally his.
We are not talking about function now. What the portal is designed to do and how it will work. We are talking legality.
We need to set something up that defines what Bob's legal powers entail, as owner and what is expressly understood between Bob and all boards choosing to associate themselves on the board and vice versa.
Beff is not saying somthing bad will happen. Maybe nothing will come of it. But it makes good sense to cover your ass as best you can so you don't throw out the baby with the bath water.
Remember now, suppose we do this and someone else pays the next year. So now there is another owner, Stan! What kind of person is Stan as compared to Bob?
Having this all in place leaves nothing to chance no matter how things change.
I mean, it's better than having Sam and Grevious (Han) hunt you down all over the web..
:b
