FreePlays.org

Considerations

The desired, and primary, effect of this site is to make drama, and especially kids' drama, easier. Here's a typical task list for someone who wants to put on a kids' play:

Choose the kids
Deal with the parents, guardians, well-meaning assistants, pests, bureaucrats, and busybodys that inevitably come along with efforts involving kids
Figure out scheduling and venue of performances
Figure out scheduling and venue of rehearsals
Obtain scripts, pick one or more plays to perform
Cast, rehearse, recast
Deal with the kids
Put on the performances
Handle the money (selling tickets, soliciting contributions, selling advertising, accounting, guarding against theft/fraud, dealing with the inevitable suspicions, jealousies, greed, and other unpleasant stuff that comes along with handling money)
Deal with legal details of permissions and royalties. Correspondence, writing checks, maintaining the paperwork, figuring out and/or negotiating the details of all the various copyright owners' various terms and restrictions. Getting it all right so that the ultimate bad thing (you have to cancel your performance because you didn't get the rights) doesn't happen.

There are other tasks, and the task list for grownup plays differs somewhat. The purpose of FreePlays.org is to make step 5 very easy and to eliminate step 10. Two less hassles; it isn't much in the overall scheme of things, but it's a help.

Every action has not just one effect. Side-effects of this site, if it succeeds, include:

Certain established businesses (dramatic publishing companies) will earn less money
There will be a higher proportion of "amateur" scripts read, used, and performed. If we don't do a good job, this could result in a degradation of script quality. On the other hand if we do it right, the overall quality of scripts could be improved.
Authors will not get paid for works they contribute to this site, thus eliminating some portion of author income.
Authors will get free exposure from this site, thus promoting authors' fame and fortune.

Discussion and debate

People have a lot to say about an effort like this. There are a few points of view:

You shouldn't ask artists/authors/playwrights to contribute their work for free. This is disrespectful to them, or anti-market, or people should simply get compensated for their works.
Playwrights already have a hard enough time. They really need the encouragement that an occasional $25 royalty payment can give them.
Giving away plays, especially to and for use by kids, is great.
I'm an author, and if I feel like making my work available free, that's my prerogative.

Here are some of the letters and discussion that people have contributed.

All works on this site are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License. In short:

You are free to print, copy, read, use, distribute, modify, and perform any and all of these works without royalty.
If you distribute these works in any form (including recordings of performances), with or without modification, you must grant these same royalty-free rights.

For details, see Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License either here or here

This site is part of the Info Ring. Information wants to be free! So make some free information.