I just got off the phone with Slim. He suggested attending the Game Developer Conference http://www.gdconf.com/ This is the big annual game conference for the industry where multimillion-dollar deal are made on the convention floor.

He pointed out that as soon as we have a finished product that is freeware some company would take it and go commercial with a license. We could continue with the fan version but we would not see as much fan interest. It is not a might happen. It will happen.

Mike’s alternative is to keep the playable game restricted access until it is complete. Then he might have a chance of making a deal at a place like the GDC.

Slim has spoken

Slim's a sharp guy with more industry experience than anyone here, but his concerns about a publisher taking our work and going commercial with it on their own are a bit paranoid. First, while the source code uses an open-source license, it is not a permissive license; it is a reciprocal license. That means that any project based of ours must continue to share the code, including any modifications and enhancements, under the same license. Furthermore, the game's creative content uses a different license, which includes an explicit non-commercial stipulation. Anyone wanting to take Supremacy and sell it, without my cooperation, would not be able to distribute any of our graphics, 3D models, audio, or in-game text without being subject to legal repercussions. Lastly, there are plenty of open-source game projects out there, and I have yet to see Slim's scenario play out with any of them. So don't fret; Supremacy builds will remain freely available to the public, and you will never have to pay to play the game.

Licensing aside, I'm an exceptionally devious guy, and don't think I'll be shipping a game without including some potential counter-measures to expose unauthorized distributions of the game .

On the subject of the GDC, I think it would be an interesting and potentially "profitable" experience in that the added exposure might snag us some more volunteers. I'm not looking for a publishing deal, though. This year's GDC was last month, which gives us nearly a year to prepare should we want to make plans for GDC 2011.